Part 25 (1/2)

[375] PLACE, _Ninive_, vol. i. p. 234; vol. iii. plates 9 and 17.

[376] _Ibid._ vol. iii. plate 14. We should have reproduced this composition in colour had the size of our page allowed us to do so on a proper scale. M. Place was unable to give it all even in a double-page plate of his huge folio.

[377] PLACE, _Ninive_, vol. iii. plates 23-31.

[378] Layard, _Monuments_, 2nd series, plates 53, 54. Elsewhere (_Discoveries_, pp. 166-168) Layard has given a catalogue and summary description of all these fragments, of which only a part were reproduced in the plates of his great collection.

[379] _Ibid._ plate 55.

[380] GEO. SMITH, _a.s.syrian Discoveries_, p. 79.

[381] Botta gives examples of some of these bricks (_Monument de Ninive_, plates 155, 156). Among the motives there reproduced there is one that we have already seen in the bas-reliefs (fig. 67). It is a goat standing in the collected att.i.tude he would take on a point of rock. The head of the ibex is also a not uncommon motive (LAYARD, _Monuments_, first series, plate 87, fig. 2; see also BOTTA).

[382] Fig. 1 of our Plate XIV. reproduces the same design, but with a more simple colouration.

[383] J. E. TAYLOR, _Notes on Abou-Sharein_, p. 407 (in the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, vol. xv.).

[384] PHILOSTRATUS, _Life of Apollonius_, i. 25. Cf. DIONYSIUS PERIEGETES, who says of Semiramis (v. 1007, 1008):

autar ep' akropolei megan domon eisato Beloi chrusoi t' ed' elephanti kai aguroi askesasa.

[385] HERODOTUS, i. 98.

[386] See above, p. 202.

[387] LAYARD, _Nineveh_, vol. ii. p. 264, note 1. Frequent allusions to this use of metal are to be found in the wedges. In M. LENORMANT'S translation of the London inscription (_Histoire ancienne_, vol. ii. p.

233, 3rd edition) in which Nebuchadnezzar enumerates the great works he had done at Borsippa, I find the following words: ”I have covered the roof of Nebo's place of repose with gold. The beams of the door before the oracles have been overlaid with silver ... the pivot of the door into the woman's chamber I have covered with silver.”

[388] Among the fragments of tiles brought from Nimroud by Mr. George Smith, and now in the British Museum, there are two like those reproduced above, to which bosses or k.n.o.bs of the same material--glazed earthenware--are attached. The necks of these bosses are pierced with holes apparently to receive the chain of a hanging lamp, and are surrounded at their base with inscriptions of a.s.surn.a.z.irpal stating that they formed part of the decoration of a temple at Calah.--ED.

[389] The size of our engraving is slightly above that of the object itself.

[390] 1 _Kings_ vi. 15; vii. 3.

[391] ZEPHANIAH ii. 14.

[392] The design consists entirely in the symmetrical repet.i.tion of the details here given. [In this engraving the actual design of the pavement has been somewhat simplified. Between the knop and flower that forms the outer border and the rosettes there is a band of ornament consisting of the symmetrical repet.i.tion of the palmette motive with rudimentary volutes, much as it occurs round the outside of the tree of life figured on page 213. In another detail our cut differs slightly from the original. In the latter there is no corner piece; the border runs entirely across the end, and the side borders are stopped against it.--ED.]

[393] LAYARD, _Discoveries_, p. 184, note.

[394] LAYARD, _Nineveh_. vol. ii. p. 212, note.

[395] LAYARD, _Discoveries_, p. 281.

[396] PRISSE D'AVENNES, _Histoire de l'Art egyptien d'apres les Monuments_ (2 vols folio): see the plates ent.i.tled _Couronnements et Frises fleuronnes_.

-- 8.--_On the Orientation of Buildings and Foundation Ceremonies._

The inhabitants of Mesopotamia were so much impressed by celestial phenomena, and believed so firmly in the influence of the stars over human destiny, that they were sure to establish some connection between those heavenly bodies and the arrangement of their edifices. All the buildings of Chaldaea and a.s.syria are orientated; the principle is everywhere observed, but it is not always understood in the same fas.h.i.+on.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 143.--Plan of a temple at Mugheir; from Loftus.]